BigMachines is getting bigger. The 11-year-old, cloud-based provider of software that helps sales organizations within companies such as GE, Symantec and Panasonic generate prices and quotes for complex, configurable products, is hiring about 100 employees, most of whom will be based in Chicago.

That surge, which will push the Deerfield-based company's headcount above 300, is based on substantial revenue growth. BigMachines earned $32.1 million in 2010, making it the 42nd-fastest-growing private company in Chicago, according to the 2011 Inc. 5000. That growth has accelerated in 2011, as the company booked 92% more business in the first half of this year than in the first half of 2010.

BigMachines' challenge is to fend off cloud-based configuration, pricing and quoting, or CPQ, rivals such as Dallas-based FPX, as well as traditional, on-site CPQ providers who are moving to the cloud, such as Cameleon Software, a French company whose U.S. headquarters are in Skokie.

This week, about 400 of BigMachines' customers and prospects are at the Swissotel in Chicago for BigMachines' annual "Big Ideas" conference.

BigMachines President David Bonnette, an Oracle veteran who joined BigMachines earlier this year, introduced version 12 of the company's software in a keynote address Monday morning. He tells Silicon City about BigMachines' potential.

Crain's: How sizable is the market opportunity for BigMachines?

David Bonnette: It's vast. (When we look forward), we talk about a company much, much bigger than what we are right now. The opportunity is vast because the cloud is not going anywhere — it's the first or second inning. And what makes BigMachines unique is the diversity of our customer base: companies that make potato chips, companies that make silicon chips, and companies with revenues from $20 million to $20 billion.

David Bonnette

Much bigger companies are pushing the cloud, such as Salesforce, IBM, Oracle, SAP, Microsoft. That's generated an economic draft we could never create on our own, and it has a lot to do with why companies like ours are off the ground. Now, how do you stay off the ground and began to break away?

Companies that can standardize quickly and go solve problems out of the box generally break out. That is generally very defensible. So we are positioned right now to break out, and that's what we're doing.

Crain's: What's your formula for breaking out?

DB: Survival in software comes down to two things, scale and standards. That's how this industry is made up. Those companies that scale well, like an Oracle, get to establish standards. That puts a lot of pressure on companies that don't have the scale to set standards and can't make the investments to create standardized products.

BigMachines grew nearly 100% in the first half of this year — we're extraordinarily healthy. So we could just keep doing what we've been doing. Or we could go try to break out. And that's what we're doing. We're making that investment into our products and our processes so that we're scale- and growth-ready. We've made all our processes, from how we address clients to how we support and retain them, scalable and repeatable. So now, when we take on a lot of really big clients, we're ready for that, and we're ready in a way that's repeatable, not just a one-off for one particular big client.

Crain's: How is the relationship between cloud-based providers and clients in your industry different than with traditional, location-based solutions?

DB: There is good pressure on cloud providers to deliver. You can't hide behind a crummy, big, unsuccessful implementation. Customers will leave.

A good thing about the cloud from a customer perspective is that (compared with establishing a location-based, custom solution), it's easy on and, generally speaking, easy off. Customers can ditch you if they want to. So we're in the business of maintaining subscriptions, the same sort of model as a magazine. If customers don't like what we're giving them, they can shut it down at tend of the term, and that puts great pressure on cloud providers to stay innovative and make sure we help our customers remain agile and productive.

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In Other Local Tech News:

• It's a big week for cloud-based B2B companies with similar names. . . .Chicago-based BigTime Software, a provider of productivity tools for professional services firms, added former Microsoft VP Todd Warren to its advisory board last week.

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Steve Hendershot

"Silicon City" is a weekly report on Chicago tech news and newsmakers written by Crain's contributor Steve Hendershot.